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How is a food item determined to be gourmet? In general it needs to have a distinctive flavor. It it's hard to get or rate it ups the ante. It it's expensive there is another notch in the belt. Kopi luwack is the most rare coffee in the world and it meets all the qualifications. The cost averages $75 per quarter pound. It is a gourmet coffee. Kopi is the Indonesian word for coffee. Luwak comes from the the islands of Java, Sumatra and Sulawesi, which are a part of the Indonesian Archepelago's islands.

Let's talk about the taste. The flavor has been described as rich and heavy. There are hints of chocolate and caramel with earthy undertones.The texture is syrupy. Coffee experts everywhere seem to agree it is excellent.

Recently this coffee got a bit of notoriety from the movie "Bucket List". The character who appeared to have unlimited money sources enjoyed this rare coffee. But, his friend tended to snub his nose at the notion. Why?

Perhaps it has to do with the origin of the coffee beans and the methods of collecting them. The coffee beans grow in trees on the island. They are a dark red cherry like bean. These beans are eaten at the peak time for harvesting by a marsupial called a Paradoxurus. It looks like a cross between a cat and a monkey. It is related to the mongoose and lives comfortably around humans. It rounds it's dinner plate out with bugs and other fruits. The beans then are processed in the stomach of the paradoxurus. It goes through a fermentation process in the digestive system. The bean exits the mammal with the rest of the fecal matter, but the actual bean stays intact.

Then the local pickers gather the fecal matter from the forest floor. The beans are picked out, cleaned and roasted. These beans are then ground just like any other coffee. It is a little hard to determine what your crop yield may be. You have to count on the trees having enough fruit and then also the animals eating the diet that is most conducive for your beans. The local pickers have a tedious and rather unpleasant job and all this adds to the cost of the coffee. On a normal year about 500 pounds of the coffee is all is produced.

This isn't the only food that comes from a similar background. In Mexico and Morocco have an tree called Argan that has an olive-like fruit. Goats eat the fruit and then the pits are taken from the excrement and ground into oils used for cooking massages and as an aphrodisiac.

So if you can afford it and coffee is your thing, give it try. Most reports are positive.

Learn more about this author, Trenna Sue Hiler.
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